This work is Henry James's last novel and is a symbolically complex story of two flawed marriages. The gilded crystal bowl with its largely concealed flaw, "The Golden Bowl", is the symbolic vehicle used to reveal past misdemeanours and make the characters face the flaws in their lives.

HenryJames's last completed novel, The Golden Bowl is a symbolically complex story of two flawed marriages. The lives and relationships of Maggie Verver and her widowed American millionaire father, Adam, are changed and challenged by the beautiful and charming Charlotte Stant who is the former lover of Maggie's husband, the impoverished Italian - Prince Amerigo. The highly symbolic gilded crystal bowl with its largely concealed flaw - The Golden Bowl - is the vehicle which James cunningly uses to reveal past misdemeanours and make the characters face the flaws in their own lives in this classic talc of redemption.